PLANS for a new nuclear power station which could create thousands of jobs have been considered by Teessiders.

The Government Department of Energy and Climate Change is taking exhibitions to each of the possible sites for the energy-producing facility around the UK.

If the Hartlepool site is eventually chosen, it will create up to 9,000 construction jobs and more than 500 full-time jobs at the site.

Hartlepool’s Mayor Stuart Drummond is among those supporting the proposals.

But opponents say the town has already had its fair share of nuclear power and insist the Government should be looking at cleaner forms of energy for the future.

More than 100 people went along to exhibitions and a public discussion to find out more.

The Government has earmarked a total of 10 sites, including Hartepool on Teesside, and Sellafield, Braystones and Kirksanton in Cumbria, as possible locations for the next generation of nuclear power stations.

Ministers say nuclear power is part of an overall plan to help the environment and protect the UK’s energy supplies and a 15-week consultation on the proposals will now take place before the Government announces its final list of sites.

Town mayor Stuart Drummond has urged people to back the new power station proposals, saying: “The potential for a new power station is clearly of the utmost importance to our town.”

However, Nic Best, the Green Party’s North East spokesman, finds the proposal deplorable.

He said: “Hartlepool is seen as the waste dump of the country and just because there’s already a nuclear power station there it is seen as OK to build another one.

“The best way to reduce carbon emissions is to reduce the demand for energy. If we invest in insulating homes and improving energy efficiency we could create 50,000 jobs in the region.

“Nuclear power is not the answer to climate change, the answer is to reduce carbon emissions by reducing energy consumption. Investing in nuclear power, which is dangerous and a short-term solution is wrong - renewable energy is a better way of providing low-carbon energy.”

The new plant would be built by EDF Energy, which now incorporates British Energy, and could be open by 2025.